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1 – Valtteri BOTTAS
(Mercedes)
2 – Sebastian VETTEL (Ferrari)
3 – Lewis HAMILTON (Mercedes)
TRACKSIDE INTERVIEWS (Conducted by Davide Valsecchi)
Q: What a qualifying! Valtteri Bottas on pole position, was a spectacular
lap. Valtteri please, your lap was amazing. Less than one tenth in front of
Sebastian. Great job my friend.
Valtteri BOTTAS: Thank you. Yes, it feels good. You know I really enjoy
driving here in front of you guys, so thanks for the support but I enjoyed
it today. The car was getting better and better as the grip was coming up
and a decent lap in the end – not quite perfect but it was good enough.
Q: Very well done. It was spectacular. First row, Sebastian, very well. Good
improvement – all for you my friend. How was your lap?
Sebastian VETTEL: Not quick enough, but I was very happy. The car was really
good, last qualifying also for the last run, but then it was a bit of
anti-climax with the yellow flags but yeah, very happy. It’s a great track,
shame it’s a bit short but really enjoyable with a lot of high speed corners
and the car’s been really phenomenal so looking forward to tomorrow. Should
be a good race.
Q: Lewis, look, they love you, they love you, there’s no way… Tell me about
your last try. First corner maybe you lost the car a bit. How was the
feeling on the car?
Lewis HAMILTON: Well firstly, congratulations to Valtteri. He did a
fantastic job. He’s been driving well all weekend and obviously Sebastian’s
very quick this weekend so happy to have been third. Of course I would have
loved to improve my lap but yeah, just wasn’t meant to be today.
Q: Guys, sorry Lewis, come here. Seb, I would like to understand; now you
have a good chance. You are on the first row, maybe Lewis is a bit behind
because of the penalty. Can be good for tomorrow for you, no?
SV: We will see. It’s a long race so a lot of things that can to happen. I
think we have to look after ourselves, do our own race. It will be a tough
race with Valtteri. He’s been quick all weekend, also yesterday, setting a
good pace, so we will see. I think it should be a good race.
Q: And Lewis, will it be the aim to catch this driver tomorrow or no? I mean
the red cars, they are there…
LH: I will do the best job I can, obviously. I want to get up there and try
and get a one-two with Valtteri so I will do the best job I can to get
further up.
Q: Maybe also the soft tyres that you’re going to start on tomorrow can be
the key of your race, no?
LH: I have the supersofts for tomorrow. I think it’s generally a slower tyre
than what they are on but it can go maybe longer, we will see.
Q: Good luck to you. And Valtteri, please, last chat because today was
amazing, I’m really happy for you. Tell me, which is the aim for tomorrow:
not easy to stay in front of Sebastian but here you have a good chance. But
you are outside on the start, maybe it can be…
VB: I think like Sebastian said, it should be an interesting, good fight for
tomorrow but there’s targets, the target is not less than winning, of course
for us and I’m sure Lewis still has a good race ahead, a lot of time to come
back and get good points for us as a team. I can’t wait for tomorrow,
honestly.
Q: Best of luck, best of luck. Please guys, I need a handshake with you
both, you [Lewis] with Sebastian. Handshake. Please my friend.
LH: We’ve already stood together.
PRESS CONFERENCE
Q: Valtteri, you looked pretty hooked up throughout that session. How good
was the car, how good was that lap?
VB: Yeah, I really enjoyed it today. Always when you enjoy, normally the
result is good. Definitely got the car nice and stable for the qualifying
and just was able to build up the confidence and this is a track where you
really need it in those high-speed corners. Yeah, found the balance, didn't
really touch the car at all during the qualifying. The laps were getting
better and better and that was the result. As a team again we have done a
great job over the weekend to make the car better and I felt good today.
Q: Well done. Sebastian, so close between you and Valtteri in the end. Can
you pinpoint where you lost out? How good was the session for you?
SV: I think it was pretty good. I think Q3 was pretty good, I was very happy
with the lap. But in all fairness, what goes around, comes around. I think I
have been on the lucky side a couple of times, especially against Valtteri,
with tight gaps. I think the four hundredths today is tight. The story
continues between us two. Well done, obviously, to him. He said that he
still had a bit of margin. I was pretty happy with my lap to be honest.
Maybe there was a sniff in the last corner. It’s a short track, not easy to
get everything right, so overall I was pretty happy. The car was good. I
think we did a good step from yesterday to today, so hopefully we can carry
that into the race.
Q: Lewis, it's been a difficult day for you, with problems in the final
practice session and then having to run a different strategy during
qualifying, just talk us through the session itself.
LH: It was a pretty straightforward session, no real issues. The car was
good. Valtteri did a fantastic job today, so really happy for him. I just
didn’t hook it up when it got to Q3. Q1 and Q2 were good and then Q3 was
just so-so.
Q: Was Q3 somehow compromised by having to run the supersoft tyre in Q2?
LH: I wouldn’t say too much. Of course the tyres are a little bit different
but generally I’m experienced enough, shouldn’t be really a big problem.
QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
Q: (Tom Slater – Soymotor) Lewis, here in Austria in 2014 you started the
race P9 and you ended P2, so do you think you will be able to do this result
tomorrow and if you do will you be happy with it?
LH: I’m pretty sure that back then there was a bigger difference in speed
deltas between us and other cars so I think it’s more unlikely than it was
then, but I will give it everything I can and of course I would be happy if
I could get up there.
Q: (Peter Farkas – Auto Motor) Question for the Mercedes drivers. Valtteri,
congratulations for the pole position, you’ve always been quick at this
track, there’s a win to take tomorrow but I don’t want to suggest any
gamesmanship but obviously it would be quite an easy strategy for you to go
a bit slower in the front so Lewis can keep the pace and then he would be in
a strategic advantage at the second part of the race. Would you be willing
to do that? And Lewis, how much longer do you think you will be able to go
with the supersoft than with the ultrasoft?
VB: Well, what I’ve seen on the pre-race strategy notes, that kind of plan
is not on those notes so, yeah, we need to focus on having a good start of
the race and we need to win the race. And for sure Lewis can fight back from
where he’s starting. Y’know, if you start playing games like that here it’s
quite tricky. If the car behind gets within the DRS zones and gets a good
slipstream, it only needs one mistake and you can lose the win. So not
planning on that at the moment.
And Lewis, your strategic options for tomorrow?
LH: It makes no sense for Valtteri to slow down. That will not be the case.
It makes sense for him to push as hard as he can to win the race.
And starting on the supersoft tyre instead of the Option?
LH: I don’t think it’s going to make a big difference if I’m really honest.
It’s a slower tyre so, I think in the first stint, it’s just about length.
But lots of different things could happen: safety cars, rain, who knows?
Lewis, how confident are you of winning this grand prix from P8.
LH: I couldn’t say I was… Valtteri has been quickest all weekend, so it’s
not really on my mind at the moment.
Q: (István János Simon – Automagazin) My question is mainly to Sebastian and
Lewis. The weather forecast says there’s a high percentage of rain for
tomorrow for the race. Do you count on that? Can you calculate with that and
do you think you will be able to do a strong race if it rains when we’ve had
all the practice sessions in dry?
SV: I think it’s fair also to ask the question to Valtteri as well, he’ll be
racing tomorrow as well so if it rains we’re all affected. But, I don’t
know, I think we have a different weather forecast then. I need to check
with our guys – but, yeah, we’ll see. We have the wet tyres, they are ready.
It’s always tricky if you haven’t done a single session in the wet but I
think we had some experience last year so if it rains, it rains, we fit wets
or inters and we try to race. We’ll see.
Valtteri, wet weather?
VB: Yeah, it’s so difficult to predict here if it’s going to be wet or not.
A bit like Friday, we just need to wait and see what happens and react to
that. But of course we all want to race if it’s wet – but it depends on the
conditions.
LH: Not really much more to add. Could be helpful being that I’m eighth or
something like that. Makes it a bit more of a lottery.
Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto Motor und Sport) Lewis, when you know already
before the weekend that you’re going to lose five grid positions, what is
the mindset, is it still a normal race weekend or do you have different
strategies during Friday and Saturday?
LH: You still approach it exactly the same. Nothing changes at all, if I’m
honest. It’s just really trying to get yourself as high as possible and when
it comes to the race it’s about damage-limitation. You try to minimise the
damage. I found out on Tuesday, I think it was and, of course, you go in
with a very positive mind about coming back and fighting and then of course
something like that hits us. It’s difficult for us all to swallow but we
pull together as a team and we work as hard as we can. We’ve still got great
performance and hopefully I can do a good job for the team tomorrow and get
some good points. |
